As a recovered ‘nice guy’ who stopped blaming my relationship problems on women and finally looked to see what I could improve about myself to attract women, I’m getting more and more sick of seeing these ‘why do women hate nice guys and like jerks?’ threads. I guess one reason is that I’ve seen so many that I know how they are going to play out. I don’t bother reading them, since I know what is going on in the threads, I’m even getting good at guessing who is saying what since the same people chime in to correct the so-called ‘nice guy’ about the error of his ways.
Skipping over reading the thread contents isn’t enough for me anymore. I wince when I even read the thread title. There are so many of these whining type threads they almost deserve their own forum (pot, meet kettle, black? damn straight! )
I’ve always found this problem to be a complex one.
Most “nice guys” are actually shy/unassertive guys, I wouldn’t say they are necessarily any nicer than the general population or as nice as they think they are. It’s mainly because of intrinsic problems with how they act that they don’t get women.
Most “bad guys” are probably just more sarcastic/less nervous guys that a good number of women are attracted to.
Of course I think one serious problem is most of the men who will become very abusive emotionally or physically are in the “bad guy” category (while most stalkers are in the nice guy category.)
So theres really two types of “bad guy.”
“Bad guy” as in Charlie Sheen bad guy who’s fairly harmless but plays the part.
“Bad guy” as in beats his wife up guy.
Then there are the two nice guy types:
“Nice guy” as in shy/nerdy guy.
“Nice guy” as in painfully shy and paranoid guy that will have a shrine to his latest obsession.
Yeah, pretty much. I don’t self-identify as a Nice Guy (notice the capitalization) despite being a nice guy and I tend to roll my eyes at those same kinds of threads but this OP coming from you is a bit much considering your history on these fora. It would be like me telling others to stop posting so much or (no offense to him intended) SolGrundy posting a thread entitled “We Get it, You’re Gay; Shut the Fuck Up!”.
You’re coming off as nothing more than a holier-than-thou prick here. You learned your lesson but not before a lot of similar whining and, honestly, I’m happy you’re over the hump but don’t look down your nose on those that have yet to. It’s not very becoming and won’t endear you to many here.
Ok, but what of the lurkers who have read other ‘nice guy’ threads but make their own anyway? Doesn’t that grate on you? Because it sure does for me. Sure I had to overcome that trial in my life, but looking back makes me loathe my former self so much more, because a big part of the problem of these guys is selfishness, not naievity
Frankly you’re reaching at what’s at the fundamental heart of the problem with the SDMB’s old threads. I know that there’s a search function in the corner, but a part of this board is all about the dialog and reanswering the smae questions more specifically.
When it comes to personal problems, who wants to be told, “Frankly, we’ve seen your type around here and rather than answer your OP, I want to point you towards several threads on this topic from the past half-decade, including thread 155687, 215687, and especially 288865.”
People have their own experience, their own back-story, and hence their own threads which people are free to offer their own responses to. You’re complaints about these new “nice-guy” threads come off as rather assholish given that you were in a similar position a short while ago. This isn’t like asking cut and dried questions like, “What’s the average resting heart-rate of Sub-Saharran dromedaries following a mid-May sojurn of approximately 125 km?”
Shut up a deal, or even better, offer your own experience and growth to people undergoing the process again.
Even assuming you’re right in that the people who posted the most recent Nice Guy threads had read all previous incarnations, it doesn’t negate your hypocrital condescension. I’m not trying to be an asshole to you and you do have a bit of a point in that the people whining are generally doing it out of selfishness but, really, your complaints and the way you presented them in the OP are going to get you roasted.
Loathing your past or present self for some annoying but otherwise innocuous character flaw is one thing, but to disdain someone else for it something else entirely. To use the quintessential SDMB example, I hate that I’m fat and I am often disgusted at myself for it but if I were to drop a hundred pounds and then post an OP in the Pit asking if everyone can please just shut up about dieting already, can you imagine how viciously I would be attacked?
So in your book, a nice guy is either shy and nerdy, or shy and paranoid… :rolleyes:
I’m beginning to think that the term “nice guy” has become so cliche that it has now come to really mean “shy/insecure guy” instead of “guy who is nice/not a jerk.”
That’s fine, hijack the word, it happens all the time. But it seems that it’s gone even further than that now. If I read some of these posts right, it seems that some people are denying the very existence of a normal, socially well-adjusted “guy who is nice/not a jerk.” There’s not enough roll-eye smileys to express how idiotic an outlook that is. Do you really believe this?
I just hope the people expressing this view aren’t responsible for raising any sons. It seems the best you could hope for is a “Charlie Sheen bad guy who’s fairly harmless but plays the part”-type son, and that’s just depressing. This attitude would make me even more concerned if I was raising a daughter, who would have to grow up and deal with all the guys that were brought up to be jerks.
The problem is, though, that many of the self-proclaimed “nice guys” really do fall under the category of shy/insecure. And a small (but unfortunately vocal) section are more bitter/misogynistic than anything else. I think it’s easy for those of us reading and trying to respond to the threads to become jaded and just assume that the “nice guy” doing the complaining is painfully insecure at best, and a total dickhead at worst. If “nice guy” has been hijacked, it’s been by certain people claiming the term for themselves, not by people using it to describe others.
Maybe we need a second term to describe “nice guys” who are actually guys who are nice. I nominate “Swell Fellas.”
And now any guy who is genuinely nice is immediately assumed to be a misogynist.
The terms “selfish” and “misogynist” are attached to “nice guy” far too often. It’s as if any guy that would so much as smile at a woman must, by default, have the Evil of Morgoth in his heart. Many is the time I have read a thread in which a guy laments that he has no girlfriend. Invariably, within 3 posts, someone is accusing him of being a selfish asshole. Several posts later come the accusations of puppy kicking.
To a Nice Guy, this is very confusing. It makes him try even harder to be nice, which garners even more derision, and the vicious cycle has begun. Too bad. Nice guys don’t need derision. They need to be made aware that they’re playing the game wrong. I say this from my own experience as a former Nice Guy. There was no evil in my heart, no malice towards women, though sometimes my frustration level expressed itself in that way. If only someone had told me not to be so “nice”, my life might have gone very differently. It was the one bit of advice that people were not offering.
Well, no. Misogyny is assumed when the OP declares that he is a “Nice Guy” and then goes on about how women are thoughtless dick teasers who refuse to scratch the surface of his shyness and find the shining sun of his wonderful personality but instead leave damp spots on the couch any time an escaped felon waggles an eyebrow at them.
Pretty much, any time a guy starts off a thread bemoaning how he can’t find a girlfriend and places all the blame on the female half of the species (because how on earth could he be doing anything wrong?) or starts the whole “women don’t like nice guys, they like psychopathic child killers who eat raw nuns, and I’m sick of it”, the bullshit meter in my head goes off.
Because those who make an enormous deal of being a “nice guy” are far too often casting themselves in the role of victim and all women in the universe in the role of evil creatures who cackle maniacally as they grind the poor, innocent “nice guy” into the dirt with their stilleto heels.
Again, not so much. However, when a guy smiles at a girl, but she doesn’t immediately rip her blouse off her chest, flop on her back with legs spread screaming “take me now you STUD!” and the guy comes here complaining that women hate him and we’re all evil, EEEVVIIIILLLL, I tell you…that’s when we start looking for a maia or two to smack him with.
And many is the time I read one of these threads wherein a poster says “I don’t have a girlfriend. All the hot chicks ignore me, and I don’t want to date an ug or a fattie.”
How about this, then:
You and you alone are responsible for your feelings and yourself. If you find that the women you approach are cold, manipulative skanks, then maybe, just maybe, you’ve made a habit of approaching cold, manipulative skanks. Yes, if you wish, you may start behaving like a jerk, and you will get attention from these cold, manipulative skanks. That’s because they are, by definition, unhealthy people who lack the ability to take part in a healthy relationship.
Along with that, understand that there is a wide gulf between being a genuine nice guy and a doormat. Most of the guys I’ve known that whine on and on about how they’re so nice, and women don’t treat them right have not been nice guys. They’ve been spineless wimps who would take any amount of abuse from a particular woman because they’d rather have a hottie hanging off their arm than a woman who would treat them with respect and compassion.
The weenie “nice guys” out there have a matching stereotype on the female side, the women who only like “jerks” and will let men walk all over them. Not all women are like that, but the only way to find those women is to turn off the whine siren for a while and watch the people around you, taking note of how they treat one another as opposed to how they fit into their thong underwear.
No, I actually think you’re rather a (gasp) nice guy. Note the lack of capital letters. However, if you insist,
Gabe!
You are such a stalker! All Nice Guys are misogynistic assholes! And they’re just digging for gold anyway, and most of them kick puppies, don’t you know?
I’m with ** Incubus ** actually. This isn’t nearly as complex as you guys are making it out- it’s a relatively simple problem with a relatively simple solution.
Constant whining in innumerable threads about it never got anyone anywhere, so it does get kind of old.
(Then again, I get really sick about “My <insert random garden-variety pet here> died” threads. I got news for ya… pets die. It’s the natural way of things. Yours was no more special than anyone else’s, and everyone who has a pet die feels much the same way, so keep it to yourself.)
From my experience, women want fun, excitement, mystery, sex/sexiness out of dating, much like men. Being constantly there and comstantly nice, nurturing, etc… doesn’t play into that- she doesn’t have to find out about you, there’s no sexual tension- hell, no tension at all, because having tension is not “nice”.
Let’s flip it around: As a guy, which would you rather go out with:
The girl who wears a turtleneck and a cardigan, has conservative hair, won’t stay out too long because she has to feed her dog, and who won’t watch “Desperate Housewives” because they’re such sluts?
OR
The girl who shows up in something kinda sexy and who has a certain air of mystery- gives off that vibe that you might just score, and who comes up with something spontaneous to do after dinner in spite of your plans?
Of course most guys would rather go out with girl #2. She’s more fun and sexier. The first girl might be better as a wife, but how many of you actually go out on dates 1-5 thinking about wives? No… you’re thinking about getting laid. (or you should). Women are much the same way, except with
The simple key to this is to just go out with all sorts of girls- fat, thin, white, black, etc… so that after a while you’ll end up becoming sort of indifferent to the prospect of a first or second date- you won’t get worked up, you’ll know that you’ll have another soon enough, and as a result, you’ll be, and more importantly, appear much more confident. Switching your dating motivation from “finding a girlfriend” to “getting laid” doesn’t hurt either. It’ll take that awful desperation and twist it into something a little less repellent to women.
Note that this doesn’t at all mean that you have to be mean, and kick children you see in the streets on your date, or anything like that. Being “nice” has its place, and that place is after you’re in a long-term relationship with someone.
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